Are breast exams necessary while nursing?

I try to do breast self-exams, but I am breastfeeding. What are your recommendations about self-exams and mammograms while nursing?
I also remember hearing that breastfeeding decreases the chances of getting all kinds of cancer, including breast cancer. Is this true?

Monthly breast self-exams are just as important when you're pregnant or nursing as at any other time in your life. Perhaps even more so, because women who get breast cancer during pregnancy or while nursing may have a worse prognosis as the diagnosis is often made at a later stage. Physiologic changes that occur with pregnancy and lactation can make it harder to detect and evaluate breast lumps and pregnant women or new moms live's are focused on things other than breast cancer.

Breast self-exams help you get to know what's normal. Granted, when you're pregnant or nursing your breasts will feel quite different from before pregnancy. Early in pregnancy, breasts often feel the way they do right before you get your period, tender and full. As pregnancy continues the fullness remains, yet the tenderness usually subsides. During breastfeeding, the glands swell with milk making the breasts full and lumpy.

It's best to do a breast self-exam after a feeding so the breasts are relatively empty. Any prominent lump that doesn't go away with massage needs to be checked out. Ultrasound, aspiration, core needle biopsy and surgical biopsy are all safe in pregnancy or while nursing. Mammography during pregnancy or lactation can be painful and usually isn't very helpful because the breast tissues are more prominent making it harder to interpret the pictures. Routine mammograms, for women with no symptoms, are generally scheduled three to six months after the end of nursing to allow breast tissues time to recover.

Breastfeeding offers many healthy benefits to mother and baby alike. It can prevent ovulation and will decrease the risk of ovarian cancer.

The results from studies looking at the effect of breastfeeding on breast cancer risk have been mixed -- some say it helps, others don't show a difference. A recent study from Yale University found that Chinese women who breastfed their babies for at least two years cut their risk of breast cancer by up to 50 percent. The researchers say they don't know why it lowers risk but speculate that prolonged nursing reduces overall exposure to estrogen. These findings are encouraging, yet hard to apply to American women who typically breastfeed for a much shorter length of time.

So, get to know your breasts and check them regularly. But above all, enjoy the time with your baby.

Stay well!

Labels: Breastfeeding